Flat Broke
‘THE Daily Mail gets a chance to stick the boot into two of its favourite targets in one story today and as a bonus, the story is all about house prices.
| Hair by Elton John |
The targets are the trendy north London middle-classes and working women, and specifically, former BBC arts correspondent Rosie Millard.
Rosie made the mistake of complaining about the fact that she and her TV producer husband had run up debts of £40,000 on their credit cards, and invited public ridicule by describing herself as part of a generation of impoverished professionals.
She puts her debts down to a penchant for expensive clothes, Stila make-up and decent haircuts. (Readers can judge for themselves whether this money was well spent by turning to page 29 of the paper, where Rosies distinctive look is displayed in full colour.)
Millard is estimated (by the Mail) to earn about 70 grand a year from her new job as a journalist. She claims that although her family appear comfortably off, in reality we have no money.
This is because five years ago she and her husband started dabbling in the property market after deciding that living in one house with a mortgage was boring. Now they find themselves in debt.
But all is not lost. Rosies dabbling has left her with a listed building in Islington and another house in Hackney which, for reasons best known to herself, she calls Millard Towers I and Millard Towers II. The first is worth £900k and the second £700k.
In addition, she has two loft apartments in the City of London, and an apartment in the centre of Paris. All in all, the portfolio is reckoned to be worth £2.3 million.
The Mail suggests that an easy way to pay off her card debts would be to sell one of her five homes. But Rosie is not prepared to go down that road.
We are sad property people, she says, by way of explanation.
Ed Barrett’
Posted: 7th, April 2005 | In: Tabloids Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
